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When your memories can no longer be trusted
May 29, 2008You went to a wedding yesterday. The service was beautiful, the food and drink flowed and there was dancing all night. But people tell you that you are in hospital, that you have been in hospital for weeks, and that you didn't go to a wedding yesterday at all.
The experience of false memories like this following neurological damage is known as confabulation. The reasons why patients experience false memories such as these has largely remained a mystery. Now a new study conducted by Dr Martha Turner and colleagues at University College London, published in the May 2008 issue of Cortex offers some clues as to what might be going on.
The authors studied 50 patients who had damage to different parts of the brain, and found that those who confabulated all shared damage to the inferior medial prefrontal cortex, a region in the centre of the front part of the brain just behind the eyes.
"The patients who confabulated had varying levels of memory ability, and varying levels of "executive functioning" (the set of cognitive abilities overseen by the prefrontal cortex that control and regulate other abilities and behaviours), so confabulation cannot be as simple as a combination of these deficits. Instead it must be due to a specific function controlled by the inferior medial prefrontal cortex. Damage to this region appears to lead to the convincing experience of false memories" says Martha Turner, corresponding author for this study.
This study has implications for our understanding of how the human brain controls memory, and how most of us are able to easily tell apart true memories from things we have imagined, dreamed or invented.
Elsevier
"The patients who confabulated had varying levels of memory ability, and varying levels of "executive functioning" (the set of cognitive abilities overseen by the prefrontal cortex that control and regulate other abilities and behaviours), so confabulation cannot be as simple as a combination of these deficits. Instead it must be due to a specific function controlled by the inferior medial prefrontal cortex. Damage to this region appears to lead to the convincing experience of false memories" says Martha Turner, corresponding author for this study.
This study has implications for our understanding of how the human brain controls memory, and how most of us are able to easily tell apart true memories from things we have imagined, dreamed or invented.
Elsevier
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At birth, children with Down syndrome aren't developmentally delayed. But as they age, these kids fall behind. Memory deficits inherent in Down syndrome hinder learning, making it hard for the brain to collect experiences needed for normal cognitive development.
Scientists decipher the formation of lasting memories
Researchers at Karolinska Institutet have discovered a mechanism that controls the brain's ability to create lasting memories. In experiments on genetically manipulated mice, they were able to switch on and off the animals' ability to form lasting memories by adding a substance to their drinking water.
Forget all about it: Traumatic memories can be erased
It is well known that fear memories are permanent. However, a recent paper in Science, evaluated by three Faculty Members for F1000, reports an extraordinary finding that supports the use of a drug to control recollections of traumatic incidents.
Theory about long and short-term memory questioned by UCL scientists
The long-held theory that our brains use different mechanisms for forming long-term and short-term memories has been challenged by new research from UCL, published today in PNAS.
Weizmann Institute scientists reveal how some aromas are bound up in our memories
From Proust's Madeleines to the overbearing food critic in the movie Ratatouille who's transported back to his childhood at the aroma of stew, artists have long been aware that some odors can spontaneously evoke strong memories.
This is your brain on fatty acids
Saturated fats have a deservedly bad reputation, but Johns Hopkins scientists have discovered that a sticky lipid occurring naturally at high levels in the brain may help us memorize grandma's recipe for cinnamon buns, as well as recall how, decades ago, she served them up steaming from the oven.
Being a standout has its benefits, study shows
Standing out in a crowd is better than blending in, at least if you're a paper wasp in a colony where fights between nest-mates determine social status.
Study pinpoints key mechanism in brain development, raising question about use of antiseizure drug
Researchers at the Stanford University School of Medicine have identified a key molecular player in guiding the formation of synapses - the all-important connections between nerve cells - in the brain.
Police sketch artist evolves
Criminals are having a harder time hiding their faces, thanks to new software that helps witnesses recreate and recognize suspects using principles borrowed from the fields of optics and genetics.
Why one way of learning is better than another
A new study from the Montreal Neurological Institute and Hospital (The Neuro) of McGill University reveals that different patterns of training and learning lead to different types of memory formation.
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